“You cannot buy a self-driving car.”

Source: The Drive

It’s not every day that you get to hear stories about drivers crashing their Tesla into concrete barriers.

So basically, in March of 2018, a federal investigation began when an Apple employee crashed his expensive Tesla into a concrete wall. Last Tuesday, the investigation came to a conclusion that the driver was playing an online game at the time of his accident.

For this purpose, the National Transportation Safety Board coordinated a hearing on Tuesday. The chairman Robert Sumwalt blamed Tesla for the driver’s unexpected death. In the hearing, the chairman asserted that Tesla needs to be specific when describing how its autonomous driving system works.

The 38-year old Apple engineer was 38 at the time of his death. His family had sued Tesla, claiming that the autopilot feature of Model X is at fault. 

Source: Business Insider 

After getting access to his phone logs, it was discovered that the driver was playing Three Kingdoms, a mobile video game, instead of driving the car.

Although the agency had harsh words against Tesla, it can’t be denied that it was the driver’s fault to a large degree. He should have been more attentive when the car started driving dangerously.

Tesla has made it clear that the users need to keep their hands on the wheels at all times. In fact, they’ve repeated time and again that the drivers need to keep both of their eyes on the road, even when they’re driving on the autopilot mode.

Interestingly, Sumwalt also made a case against Apple. He berated its policies and protested that it needs to have a clear personal electronic device policy for its employees. This was considered to be a weak argument as Apple defended by saying that its employees are expected to abide by the law anyhow.

Moral of the story: Do not take your hands off the wheel.